Friday, April 22, 2011

Philately Fridays: Amsterdam's Postzegelmarkt

While in Amsterdam in early April, I was pretty excited to discover a small cluster of shops specializing in old coins, postcards, and most importantly, vintage postage stamps. If that weren't enough, each Wednesday morning, local stamp and coin dealers set up booths about 20 paces around the corner from these shops and sell their goods. I'm used to crotchety record dealers who hardly make up in tact what they lack in hygiene. By way of comparison, these Dutch stamp dealers were all super friendly and the general atmosphere of a stamp sale was much more enjoyable than that of a record fair. Here's a small sample of the great stamps I came up on at the market and surrounding shops.

Netherlands, 2001 / Click image for larger viewSix stamp set by Dutch graphic artist and screenprinter Harmen Liemburg. While we were visiting his studio, Harmen mentioned this stamp set he had designed and I was really happy to find it in the first shop we set foot in.

If you're ever in Amsterdam on a Wednesday between 10am and 4pm, I recommend stopping by the Postzegelmarkt right here.